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The ideal and the sufficient
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 August 2013
Many now claim that morale is the most important single ingredient in military success, but this is false. If it had been true, the 9th and 50th Divisions could not have won their last campaigns. Even when morale was at its peak early in the war, it could not fully overcome basic weaknesses in training, equipment and tactics. By 1944 the 9th and 50th were tired and browned off. How, then, did they succeed?
First, while most Germans continued to fight well in 1944, they were also on the same downward slope as the British. The Germans supposedly fulfilled the model of ideal morale, but this was not true and 50th Division saw ample evidence of declining morale and quality in the German Army in Normandy and the Low Countries. Even the Japanese surrendered to the 9th Division far more often in OBOE than they had a year before in New Guinea. As far as morale goes, the two sides were on the same level. German and Japanese tactics were also largely defensive, and very costly as well.
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